The increase in the age limit was seen as part of a national trend to raise the legal age in states to reduce teen road deaths and injuries. The federal government has threatened to withhold federal funds for state highways that would not raise the age limit until 1986. Anne Russell, director of public policy programs for mothers against impaired driving (MADD), said a uniform age for alcohol consumption is necessary to avoid what the group calls “blood thresholds.” If not, she said, “encourage driving between states to drink. And they repel impairment. The chambers of the council`s district building were filled with a crowded crowd including Antiochian supporters and college-age people, some of whom said they wanted to voice their opposition to changing the age of alcohol. The district`s drinking age is now 18 for beer and wine and 21 for spirits. Members of Congress and officials from Maryland and Virginia who have already raised their drinking ages have argued that the county has become a magnet for local youth who come to town to drink and then go home drunk. The U.S. House of Representatives last week passed a proposal that would give states two years to raise the drinking age to 21. If they didn`t, their federal funds for roads would be cut by 5 percent in the third year and 10 percent in the fourth. A study by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, published in January, found that young people born before the age of 15 later in life, they were twice as likely to abuse alcohol later in life as those who started at age 21, and four times more likely to become alcoholics. The study also found that a 13-year-old who started drinking has a 44 percent chance of becoming an alcoholic, whether or not there is a family history of substance abuse.
The new Alcohol Act prohibits anyone under the age of 21 from buying, possessing or drinking beer. However, the law exempts those who have already reached the state`s drinking age of 19. The provincial Wine and Spirits Act remains 21 for all persons. But in Montgomery County, which has seen the effects of teen alcohol abuse in recent years, parents, teachers, school officials, police and students themselves are aggressively cracking down on underage drinking. In doing so, I discovered that they learned a lot about something that parents rarely see their children drink. Leonard had launched Drawing the Line 18 months earlier as an adviser to Montgomery County Council member Gail Ewing, who made teen drinking a campaign priority. The idea was not to teach moderation to children, but to establish zero tolerance for underage drinking through a combination of law enforcement, education, treatment and recreation. The group`s ambitious goal, in Leonard`s words, was nothing less than “changing the environment in which children grow up.” She said yesterday that the government`s position has changed because the dynamics have changed. While many states have raised their drinking age to 21, 19 states have rejected it this year. Americans drink to death at record rates This map masks incredible complexity and variety in minor exceptions. Some states make exceptions when minors are allowed to consume alcohol. Others make exceptions if they are allowed to own it.
Still other states, such as Arkansas, do not have exemptions for possession or consumption by minors, but still make exceptions for parents who want to provide alcohol to their children. All of this adds up to a confusing mess that is almost impossible for parents, teens, and even lawyers to understand. Buried in annual reporting on the war on drugs is the fact that alcohol, not cocaine or marijuana, remains the drug of choice for children aged 12 to 17. At the same time, more and more scientific evidence has found a link not only between alcohol and car accidents, but also between alcohol and violence, alcohol and sexual assault, alcohol and drowning in adolescents, alcohol and suicide in adolescents, alcohol and unprotected sex, and between adolescent alcohol use and subsequent alcoholism. To curb drunk driving, Congress passed legislation in 1984 to force states to set an age of 21 for drinking. States that do not adapt must lose 5 percent of their federal funds for highways in fiscal year 1987, which begins Wednesday, and 10 percent the following year. The Reagan administration reversed course yesterday and voted decisively in favor of legislation to reduce federal road subsidies for states that do not raise their minimum drinking age to 21. The news in the `90s isn`t that American teens drink in high school. The real news is that they drink in college or younger, and binge drinking and frequent drinking is increasing.
Nor is it a question of boys remaining boys. Girls are catching up. ● Ironically, Meredith Wadman of Arlington made a candid report [ “Kids will be kids”? Then parents must be parents,” local opinions] of his 17-year-old brother, who died of a “fractured skull and pelvis, ruptured bladder and a right cheek torn by broken glass” in a traffic accident related to underage drinking. The Senate was looking late yesterday for the best way to change its version of a bill on drinking alcohol for a minimum age of 21, perhaps into “clean” legislation that could be quickly passed by the House of Representatives. Kahn said she had not yet consulted legal experts, but some of her colleagues also seemed to think that argument might be justified. Minnesota House Commerce President Joe Hoppe told Pioneer Press on Thursday that he included it in the committee`s schedule. Some states didn`t like to be pushed around like that. The ensuing legal fracas left us with a historic Supreme Court decision. The federal government can attach conditions to the money it gives to the states, the court ruled, but there are limits. Federal authorities, for example, cannot be overly forced. However, the court said Reagan was clear because federal funds for highways are only a tiny percentage of state budgets.
